Shift Into Iridescence

Sorry that this somehow didn't get posted yesterday...

The winner of the enamel earrings "Nothin' But Blue Skies" is Stephanie McGinley! Stephanie, please email me with your address.

The winner of the signed copy of Barbara's book Painting With Fire is Courtney Breul! Courtney, please email Miss Barbara with your address.

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The Dragonfly

a poem by Louise Bogan

You are made of almost nothing

But of enough

To be great eyes

And diaphanous double vans;

To be ceaseless movement,

Unending hunger,

Grappling love.

Link between water and air,

Earth repels you.

Light touches you only to shift into iridescence

Upon your body and wings.

Twice-born, predator,

You split into the heat.

Swift beyond calculation or capture

You dart into the shadow

Which consumes you.

You rocket into the day.

But at last, when the wind flattens the grasses,

For you, the design and purpose stop.

And you fall

With the other husks of summer.

 

When I attended the Inspired by Nature retreat in South Haven, MI in September, Heather had the idea to do a bead mixer party. We each had to bring in a 16" strand of nice beads in the colors of green, teal or purple. We cut them all apart and put them in a big stock pot. Then one of the ladies got a big spoon and stirred them all together.

There were pearls and amethysts, crystals and pressed glass, ceramic and seed beads and every shape and size you can imagine. We were each served up a healthy portion of the bead stew and challenged to get our creative juices flowing. Then we set about to create something special from this mix.

Around this same time, I had found out about a little contest that Jewelry Television was hosting. I had heard about it through the wonderful Miss Margot Potter. Do you know Miss Madge? She blogs, and writes books and comes up with unique and crafty ways to stretch your jewelry creativity. Plus she is the on-air educator for the Jewel School videos. I have found many helpful videos on there from the likes of Sherri Haab, Leslie Rogalski, Katie Hacker and more. Check it out!

The contest rules were to make a piece of jewelry and submit it for judging. That's it. There was not even a rule that you had to use a Jewelry Television product (I checked on that) which I thought was pretty generous, especially since the grand prize is valued at $5,000 ($2,500 in cash and $2,500 in JTV credit plus the chance to have the winning design created as a kit or for sale on JTV and in the Jewel School videos!).

I wanted to find out how their products stacked up against other online vendors so I gave it a shot and found a few things to try. I bought some druzy cabochons (I am thinking of filigree wrapping them) and some clay beads (which I ended up using in my ABS entry for September) and these intriguing mosaic mother of pearl shell donut beads. I never buy that shape. I don't know why. But something about the way these donuts shimmered when the light shifted and the soft colors really drew me in.

As far as a critique of JTV, I will say that I was a bit dismayed when my PayPal account was charged a separate charge for each item, instead of one charge, and it took a bit longer to receive them than I expected, but the quality of the beads and cabs was very good. Each was packaged in a separate, very sturdy and almost decorative box. Nice touch.

I started with the donut and a Czech pressed glass shimmering dragonfly button that I bought in a little bead shop in South Haven. I wanted the donut to be the focal of this garden-themed bracelet, and so I started grouping clusters of dangles in the hole, like a wrist corsage, with the bee hovering up above. I have a few of these golden bees left that are dimensional on all sides (wish I knew where I found those so long ago!) and I thought that with all the silver toned spacers and wire I was using that this little pop of gold would draw your eye in nicely.

The rest of the bracelet came together rather quickly. I used two strands of Beadalon beading wire and started with the purple peanut beads to make a button hole for the dragonfly button for the clasp. Then I just strung a random pattern of beads, weaving them in and out of the beads for structure. A few more dangles to fill the space, and voila!



{Shift into Iridescence}



I don't enter challenges because I think that I am going to win them. Often I don't make it that far. I do challenges just for the fun of it, to stretch my creative wings and to see if I can rise to it. I am very honored to have been chosen by a very esteemed panel of judges to be in the top. I have seen the other finalists and they run the gamut from metal clay to wire wrapped gemstones. Each is very beautiful in its own way.

The next phase of the Jewelry Television contest, I am told, consists of a live broadcast on Wednesday, October 26th where they will show off all the finalists. The program guide shows it from 11:00am-2:00pm (but that could be EST). They will be kicking off the popular voting portion of the contest. If you don't get the television station (check your listing guides), they do have streaming video on their website and they are on Facebook, so there might be a way to vote through those methods as well. But hurry! I believe that they will be announcing the winners on Sunday, October 30th!

I hope that you will go and check out the wonderful finalists and perhaps think about voting.  And if you choose to vote, please vote for the design that you feel really deserves the top honor (I won't know if you voted for me anyway!). I have no illusions that I am going to be in the top three after the vote, but it is certainly an honor to be selected as a finalist.

Your turn....

If you were to get $2500 for your creative business, what would you spend it on?